3. Gael Squadron will consist of the following fleet elements:
Battleship: Gael Warrior
Light Cruiser: Reannruadh
Destroyers: Iolaire, Galad, Gaidheal
Frigates: Damadas, Abu
Corvettes: Aichbheil, Teachdair, Taisgealach
4. Pursuant to request, Morganen (115411 Jul 30), Acting CO Gael Warrior, 2ndInterceptor Flight, Gael Confederation Militia, has been reassigned Battleship Gael Warrior.
5. You are directed to ensure Gael Warrior ready for space and ready for combat in all respects. As Flag Captain, Gael Squadron, you are responsible for readiness for space and combat for all elements, Gael Squadron.
6. Gael Squadron is hereby directed to proceed all reasonable speed
Trothas (ISC 237-938-2892). Gael Squadron will join 433rd Fleet currently operating Trothas system in suppression rebel forces. 7. Caesar expects every man of Gael Squadron to do utmost in name of Empire and to further glory of Caesar Julianus.
Kendric looked up from the screen of the compboard he was holding in unsteady hands. He was standing on the Gael Warrior's quarterdeck, just inboard from her main port personnel lock. Commander Lenard Morganen and two ranks of ship's officers, all clad in the austere gray of Gael Naval Militia uniforms, stood at attention a few paces away. The tradition by which a new ship's Captain read himself aboard was an old one, extending back through thousands of years of naval tradition, to a time when ships sailed only on water, and not among the stars.
"Well, gentlemen," he said after an awkward silence. "I'm afraid I don't know any of you personally...except for you, of course, Number One. But I'd like to make a point of getting to know each of you better during our trip out.
"I will want reports on each department's readiness for space and combat by 1800 hours this evening. Any special needs or problems, let me know. I'll be in my office. Number One? Will you join me there, please?"
"Yes, sir."
Kendric pondered the precise and tight-lipped formality in Morganen's reply as they walked the steel gray corridors inboard from the quarterdeck, then boarded a midship's lift for the 03 Deck. The Gael Warrior's long, wedge-shaped hull was devoted to power and propulsion systems, the massive generators for her flicker shields and gravity fields, and quarters and life support for her nearly 1200-man crew. Decks were numbered from the top deck down, starting with Deck 1, the main deck where Kendric had come aboard. Officer's country, the bridge, and most of the ship's communication and fire control facilities were located in the bridge tower, mounted above the maws of the Warrior's massive drive Venturis. Those tower decks were numbered upward from the main deck, starting with Deck 01.
Kendric was relieved to see that the battleship's layout was nearly identical to that of the Metus Magnus. Even without consulting a map display or security officer, he had been able to find his way to the Captain's cabin and office suite.
Puree!! and several of the ship's yeomen were working in the outer office. Kendric led Morganen through to his personal office, a small room with a wall-Sized bridge repeater screen on one bulkhead and a life-sized living holoportrait of Caesar on another. Caesar Julianus faced into an unseen sun, a breeze ruffling his white hair and scarlet cloak, while behind him an endless panoply of Imperial ships passed in review before a world of broad seas and glittering, interlinked city lights. Beyond, stars thronged glorious in the nebula-clotted sweep of a galactic spiral arm.
Kendric walked behind his desk, sat down, and gestured toward the room's only other chair. "O.K., Lenard. Talk to me."
"About what, Captain?" The formal reserve was a barrier between them as the younger man perched, stiff-backed, on the chair's edge.
"You know damn well about what," Kendric began. "The last time I was here..."
"The last time you were here...was when I buried my sister."
Kendric closed his eyes. This was what he had been dreading... the memories and the old wounds. "And when I buried my wife," he said. He spread his hands. "Lenard, Cara's death wasn't my fault..."
"The hell it wasn't! You took her offworld, away from her home and people. Exposed her to some damned alien disease without the proper immunization..."
Kendric shook his head. "A mistake in the paperwork..."
"A mistake in the—" Morganen's fist slammed onto the desk. "You took her away to die!"
There was no answering Morganen's fury.
Kendric had been immunized against a number of possible disease organisms when he'd first left Alba, because TOG Imperial law required it of any Human who had not received such immunizations as a child. One of those diseases was a malady commonly known as the Snow Plague, a particularly virulent mutation of one of the viral strains men had once called "the common cold." Changed from nuisance to deadly killer by mutation and selection-bred resistance to antibiotics, the disease had killed billions of people a thousand years before.
Though Humans could be immunized against the Snow Plague virus, the Gael Cluster had been cut off from the Empire at the time of the Plague. Immunization programs had only just begun within the Cluster worlds at the time Kendric had married Cara. Thus it was that Cara was not yet immunized when she travelled with Kendric to Grelfhaven. Something—a bureaucratic error, an oversight of some critical entry on a computer's data record—had resulted in officials on Grelfhaven not being alerted to her lack of vaccination. Neither Kendric nor Cara realized the gravity of this omission, for they still knew so little of the history of the TOG Empire.
Kendric and Cara had married during his first visit home to Alba, a month after he'd been accepted as a cadet at Grelfhaven. She died less than four years later, just before his graduation. He'd returned her ashes to Alba himself.
The Five Worlds, newly emerged from a Dark Age of war and bloodshed, were in many ways the center of a warrior society. For thousands of years, women had held a special place in Gael culture, no matter which of the grim Gael worlds they inhabited. With death so common amid the incessant intertribal wars and raids, women were needed to produce children—many of them—sons to fight and harvest, daughters to grow and bear more children. Women were to be protected, and Kendric had failed in his duties toward his woman, and toward his woman's family. That failure weighed on him now, as fresh as the day Cara's urn had been set in its niche in the Morganen family Remembrance Wall.
Remembering it all, Kendric closed his eyes as though that could block the pain. When he opened them again, Morganen was watching him, his long and somewhat homely face impassive and cold.
"Look," Kendric said. "I know you don't like me. You told me as much the last time I was on Alba. Frankly, I don't give a damn whether you do or don't. But your like or dislike is not going to interfere with the running of this ship. I want that clear from the start."
"Yes, sir."
"If you can't live with that, I want you off this ship. Off my ship. Understood, Mister?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good. Dismissed."
Kendric stared at the door for several long minutes after it hissed shut behind Morganen. He needed more than cooperation from his Executive Officer. He needed whole-hearted devotion.
At the moment, he hadn' t the faintest idea how he was going to win that.
Two weeks later, it was Kendric waiting on the quarterdeck as the main portside lock chuffed open with a blast of equalized pressure. To the accompaniment of a taped skirl of whistles and the thunderous background music of the TOG Imperial March Commodore Marius Estes Severno stepped onboard.
Kendric rendered the Imperial salute, conscious of the Gael salutes from the officers at his back, as a rating made the announcement, "Admiral on deck!"
"Welcome aboard, Commodore," Kendric said.
Severno nodded. "You'll be the provie Captain they told me .ibout," he said. He was a tiny man, all but lost in the black and scarlet lolds of his Imperial uniform. Though his face was creased and wrinkled, his eyes were bright and restless, as though with anticipation. "I trust this...this flee
t of yours is ready for space?"
For two weeks, Kendric had been thinking of little else, conducting drills, arranging for provisioning, working to get a feel for the crew.
"Yes, my Lord Commodore," Kendric said. The man's bluntness was a shock, his use of the word "provie" like a blow. Kendric had not heard the term directed at him for years. That he was still considered a provincial in certain Imperial circles he had no doubt, but it had been many years since anyone had made an issue of his origin.
"It'd better be." Other officers were crowding through, gathered behind the Commodore. "Here! Detail officers to take my staff to their quarters. I will want to see the flag bridge at once. Our gear is outside. Have some enlisted ratings pick it up at once and transfer it to our quarters. Snap it up, man! We have our duty to perform at Trothas!"
Another richly dressed form stepped onto the quarterdeck, and Kendric was relieved to see at least one friendly face among the new arrivals. "My Lord Administrator," he said. "Welcome aboard."
"Couldn't let you boost without saying goodbye," Elliot said. "Do you suppose we might talk for a moment?"
Kendric turned to take his leave of the Commodore and found the little man already bustling down the passageway with a junior officer in tow as guide. He turned back to Elliot and smiled. "Of course. But I can't promise how long I'll be free. I believe the Commodore is... ah...anxious to get to Trothas."
A few minutes later, they found some privacy in one of the officer lounges one level up from the port lock on Deck 01. "I wanted to wish you the best, Ken," Elliot told him. "And to give you a warning."
"A warning?"
"A small one." Elliot frowned. "Ken, you're aware that there were.. .forces at work, forces that did not want you to get this appointment."
"Yes, sir. I appreciate what you did on my behalf."
Elliot waved a hand impatiently. "I had less to do with it than you think. Frankly, your record, coupled with what happened at Tallifiero, was all the recommendation Arada and his staff needed. You may be young for this command, but you are the best choice available."
"Thank you for your confidence, sir."
"The point is, son, that I get the distinct impression down at Port
Balmarin that you are being thrown to the wolves."
Kendric had never seen a wolf, but knew the term. The mental image it conjured was something akin to a Skyean throg, hunting and tracking in small packs with remorseless patience. "You mean the Commodore?"
"No...not him. Or if he's a wolf, he's not the head of the pack. I haven't learned yet who the pack leader is...but I want you to be careful."
"Always am."
Elliot reached out slowly, touching the scarlet stone centered in the gold sunburst at Kendric's throat. "The 'Lion of Tallifiero,' wasn't it? You didn't win the Crimson Star by being careful. And you're not facing enemy broadsides here, but politics...a thousand times more dangerous."
"Politics..." Kendric spoke the word like a snorted curse.
"Don't belittle the stuff," Elliot said. "It makes men, and it breaks j. them. It can be a tool or a weapon, depending on how it is used. And : the indications at the capital are that politics are being used against 5 you."
"How?"
"I wish I knew. Chances are it's someone who hopes to accomplish some end by bringing you down, not really a personal enemy. And he's ; using Severno to do it."
Kendric shrugged. "I'm not sure what I can do about it. I'm bound by oath to obey the man's orders."
"Of course." Elliot closed his eyes for a moment, and in that instant, he looked very old. "Of course you are. Just be very sure that you follow those orders, perfectly and to the letter. A... um... call him an assistant j of mine...happened to overhear a conversation the Commodore was 1 having and passed it on to me. Don't know who he was talking to, or why. But what Severno said was, 'No matter what he does, then, we'll have him. The Lion of Tallifiero won't have any choice but to step into our trap.'"
"That's kind of slender evidence."
"And I'm not conducting a pretrial investigation. I'm warning you, j son, watch out for the wolves. And Commodore Severno..."
Less than twelve hours later, the squadron was ready for boost. Kendric flexed his fingers against the armrests of his command ! chair, conscious of the tension in his arms and shoulders. Below and around him, the Gael Warrior's bridge officers leaned over their
consoles within the bridge well, monitoring the battleship's preparations to debark.
"All stations report ship prepared for release procedure, Captain," Morganen announced.
Kendric glanced back over his shoulder at Commodore Severno. He was standing on the bridge promenade, in conversation with one of his staff officers, a Commander Braden. "Commodore? We're ready for drift."
Severno merely gave a curt nod and resumed his conversation.
Here we go, Kendric couldn't help thinking. "Very well. Engineering, switch over to internal power."
A flicker in the bridge lighting came and went almost too quickly to be noticed. Instrumentation already operating off shipboard power was unaffected.
"Switchover complete," Engineer Logan reported from the bridge engineering console. "We are on internal power. Systems nominal."
"Gravs up."
"Gravs coming up, Captain," Logan replied. "Port forward... starboard forward... port aft..."
A low vibration thrummed through the ship as her grav generators came on line.
"All external grav fields operational, in excess of 80 percent."
"Switch to internal grav."
"Internal grav, aye, sir."
The curious, inner fluttering marking the transition from Alba Port's artificial gravity to the ship's own internal grav field set Kendric's stomach to quivering. He swallowed hard and ignored the sensation, concentrating instead on the checklist that one of his monitors displayed.
"Internal gravs set and locked," the Chief Engineer reported. "All departments report gravity normal within 5 percent."
"My board is green, Captain," the Exec announced. "All airlocks secured, all departments report ready for space. Navigation beacons and running lights on."
"Very well. Maneuvering gravs to full power and stand by. Shipboard space detail, cast off all external power leads. Secure all brows."
Various faint bumps and rattlings communicated themselves through the ship's hull from outside as power lines uncoupled and were drawn back into the gleaming metal walls that still imprisoned the battleship. The boarding passageways that connected the Warrior to the station at quarterdeck and at various points along her hull retracted.
Over the intraship, Chief Trimble reported all port fittings disconnected and secured for space. A moment later, confirmation came from Port Control. The Gael Warrior was now connected to the orbital port only by the huge, magnetic clamps that gripped her hull. The thrumming vibration grew as the Engineering Department brought the maneuvering gravs up to full power.
"Message incoming from Port Control," Munro said from the com console. "Gael Warrior clear for release."
"Acknowledge." Kendric took a last look at his own console screens. The green lights confirming all departments ready glowed there, uninterrupted by red or amber. "Signal Port Control, release moorings."
The dock's mooring clamps released their magnetic locks and swung clear of the battleship's hull. With a gentle shove from the Warrior's bow maneuvering gravs, the ship began sliding astem, clear of the port berth.
"Helm, maneuver astern, slow."
"Slow astern, aye, Captain."
"Captain! Lookout astern..."
"Belay that, Helm," Kendric snapped. "Hold position!"
"All stop," the Helmsman reported. There was a gentle shudder through the ship's hull as 1,000,000 metric tons of mass were brought to a halt by straining antigravity generators. The Bridge Engineering Officer worked swiftly and without further orders from the Captain, routing additional power to the ship's protesting A-grav modules.
&nbs
p; "Port Control informed," the com officer reported. "They're compensating."
Although the Gael Warrior was no longer physically connected to Alba Port, she was still partly surrounded by the docking port. Each time a ship was launched, the station's own grav maneuvering units applied thrust to maintain the station's position. Should another ship be launched and the station be forced to maneuver even slightly while the Gael Warrior drifted there, halfway out of her berth, the ship could collide with one of those encircling metal cliffs and suffer major damage.
Kendric noted the power shift, checked that Alba Port was indeed holding its position stationary relative to the Gael Warrior, then opened a line to the Bridge Officer who had flashed the warning. "Aft lookout, what do you have?"
"Work pod at one-eight-three relative, sir."
Kendric saw it on his console repeater screen now. A gnat to the Warrior's elephant, a four-man construction module had wandered across the battleship's path, almost dead astern. The Warrior's ponderous mass would have crushed it had the Helm failed to arrest the larger vessel's motion. Neither antigravity nor the zero-G of orbit eliminated a starship's mass, or the kinetic energy of its motion. They faced a more telling problem now, however. The Gael Warrior was delicately balanced, adrift in the narrow canyon of the docking berth, and the slightest slip could bring massive destruction to both his command and to the orbital facilities.
"Probably damned civilian sightseers. Com, inform Port Control and have them clear our maneuvering zone. Helm, maintain position." Kendric felt Commodore Severno stir uncomfortably at his back. He almost felt the intense stare of Severno's eyes, but he could not let that distract him from the problem at hand. Handling the battleship was his responsibility, not the Commodore's.
It took only moments for Alba Port's Flight Control to send the pod skittering toward a nearby docking bay, and Kendric wondered if the Port Officer's language had melted the pod's com system. Whoever was in that pod was going to lose his pilot's certification for that one.
William Keith Renegades Honor Page 4
